Objective:
Global changes in atmospheric CO2, warming, and precipitation are expected to dramatically change plant communities, leading to species turnover of more than 40%. This complicates revegetation efforts, as target plant communities become moving targets. Determining which species and genotypes to use for revegetation will be one of the greatest challenges for restoration ecology in the coming decades. Here we propose to compare the performance of many Seeds of Success (SOS http://www.nps.gov/plants/sos/) accessions under future environmental conditions, and to develop methods for choosing accessions that will succeed in future environments.

Approach:
We will evaluate variation in accession establishment and growth, together with variation in traits that are expected to influence success. We will focus on global changes that influence the key limiting resource in semi-arid grasslands, water (precipitation, CO2, and temperature), and plant traits known to influence responses to those changes. This work will both quantify the potential benefits of diverse seed sources, and improve methods for using that diversity to maximize long-term revegetation success.